The shifting Colours never Fade

 Dedicated to McGhieKawaski for helping me with an idea for this chapter ;) thanks McGhie!

* * * Chapter 3 * * *

{Amy’s point of view}

“Lizzy!” I hissed, leaning across my desk towards her. She looked up at me. I tapped my colour watch, urgently trying to get my message across. Lizzy looked back at me with understanding horror in her brown eyes.

Lizzy stood up so fast that her chair scraped against the lino floor, disturbing the rest of the class. Not that they would mind, though. Any interruption during a History test was gladly accepted by many people. Mrs.Davis not being one of them.

“Elizabeth! This is a test!” Mrs.Davis growled, “Sit down at once!”

“Sorry, Mrs.Davis” Lizzy said in a rush, grabbing my arm and dragging me towards the door. “But I’ve gotta take Amy to sickbay – right now!” She pushed me out the door and, leaving behind a baffled Mrs.Davis, we made a beeline for the girls’ bathrooms, despite our excuse about sickbay.

Lizzy and I bolted through the bathroom doors, as the tingling intensified all over my body and I materialized into Periwinkle, the small, nervous, purple cat that Lizzy had first found cowering under a bush.

Lucky for me, there was no one in the bathroom other than Lizzy and I. Still, Lizzy scooped me up and bustled me into a toilet cubicle. Locking the door, she put the toilet seat down and sat with my furry purple body squirming in her lap. She stroked my fur soothingly, until I stopped writhing in her arms. Lizzy was used to this kind of thing now. Calming me down, that is.

See, ever since Lizzy discovered that I was her beloved cat – and a shape-shifting one at that – she’d made sure that when I was shifted to a cat, that she looked after me, not only a friend, but a loving owner. After all, I had been her pet cat for three hours, until I supposedly “ran away” (a cover-up to keep from Lizzy’s parents discovering my secret).

Now Lizzy set me on the ground. I sat in front of her, looking up.

“Meow...” I reminded Lizzy. She fished around in her pocket for her rainbow ear bud that my father made her. It allowed her to understand my feline language, or whatever animal language I was presently using in my shifted state.

She plucked it out of her pocket and settled it in her ear.

“’Kay” she said, laying her hands calmly on her knees. “What happened? Are you okay?” she asked, a caring look on her face.

I sighed, in my feline-sort-of-way. “You know I hate tests…” I explained, looking down at my paws. It was for this very reason that I hated them – always fearing I’d shift in the middle of a test, right before the teacher and a class full of students.

“I just got so overwhelmed. I mean, who wants a test on the first day? Especially in history, which I was looking forward to…” I tailed off, glancing back at Lizzy for a reaction. She nodded in understanding. Lizzy clicked her fingers in front of her legs, in the way you do when you want encourage a cat. I nudged her hand and purred, rolling onto my back so she could scratch my purple belly. Lizzy grabbed me under my stomach and cradled me in her arms like a baby. She took my front paw and held it in her own, human hand. But as she wrapped her hand around my paw, she quickly drew her hand back, like she’s just touched something electric. I turned my head around to look at her curiously. She was inspecting her hand, sniffing it.

“Ugh! Amy!” She said, wrinkling her pretty face in disgust. “You’ve got something on your hand - er, paw” She plonked me back on the ground and grabbed a hunk of toilet paper to wipe her hand with, flushing it down the loo when she was finished.

“Ew!” She said again unlocking the cubicle door and ushering me out towards the sinks. “Come on, we’ll wash it off now” She stooped over and heaved me up to the sink, dumping me in it and turning the warm water on. I floundered around in delight, splashing Lizzy with droplets of water and bubbles. She squeaked, giving me a scowling look, and held me firm while taking a sticky paw and washing the pink goo off the pad of my paw. She continued to scrub my paw, while I sat patiently in the warm, bubbly water. Even though I was a cat, I didn’t mind getting wet. Or washed, for that matter, because it didn’t happen often.

I was beginning to wonder whether our history teacher would make us re-sit the test when suddenly, someone barged through the bathroom door. Startled, Lizzy jumped and whacked her hand against the countertop of the sinks, knocking me in the nose with her flapping arms. We both howled in pain as the girl who’d just entered stared at us in bamboozlement.